Well-Known Member

How much experience do you have flying? When I first started out, I found it very easy to get task saturated. Too many things to manage at once. Watch YouTube, read the forums, don't rush into Sport Mode and take it s-l-o-w. Don't be like me. Third flight...fly-away right into the side of my house. I count myself as one of the lucky ones.

It's six months later and my drone is better than ever, I'm more confident and am creating great family vids (using Filmora). I'm having a blast! This Spark is more than I hoped for.

Well-Known Member

Whatever you are thinking about flying inside, about it being safer and unable to fly away, forget that. Take it out in a large open area outside, and only take off after you see the "rth updated please check it on the map". Then check it on the map to be sure it has saved. Also remember to check/set your RTH altitude higher than the highest obstacle in your flight area.

I may go overboard, but my routine when flying is this: (on the app)

Check RTH point on map
Check RTH altitude
Check/adjust max height and altitude (as a new pilot this and beginner mode are your best friend) Out of the box I think these are set at 20 and 30m respectively. Helps alleviate fears of flying away your first few times out.
Check sensors (IMU and compass)
Check wifi channel interference

Also if your homepoint takes a while to update, just do all the rest of the preflight check first, and by the time you get through those few tasks the homepoint should be updated and shown on the map in yellow.

Also learn the attitude indicator within the go app, it helps show the direction of the aircraft as well as what sort of wind the spark is seeing up where it's flying.

New Member

Buy more batteries.... I also brought the smartree portable charger... means I can go out and have 9 batteries worth of flight without having to come back to base.

As others have said, find a nice quiet empty open spot with good line of site ie fields etc practice... slowly get confident... learn the controls and def make sure RTH is set.

I can also recommend a range extender..... and I set my wifi channel to manual and it then goes to 2.4ghz which means longer distance / less video drop ( and yes... the distance is within the drone code.. ) as i was losing video even with line of site at 100m +

and the most important tip... HAVE fun.. the spark is a little sweetheart to fly

Active Member

My 2 cents worth:
-Start out in a nice big wide open field.
-Don't fly high directly overhead. (difficult for the RC to maintain connection)
-Set a suitable RTH height for the area and wait until you have enough satellites connected and good satellite health before you take off.
-NEVER launch from a location that may distort your compass reading. ie car hood, picnic table, concrete driveway, deck, anywhere steel may distort your aircrafts compass.
- Try to remember that if you ever get a message indicating that your aircraft has dropped into Atti mode, you still have control via the RC but you will need to be able to fly it with no helpers other than altitude hold and the Spark will drift with the wind have no braking action.

Well-Known Member

Housed beneath Spark’s small but sturdy frame is a mechanical 2-axis gimbal and a 12MP camera capable of recording 1080p 30fps video. The Spark also features a max transmission range of 2 km and a max flight time of 16 minutes. Learn more about DJI Spark with specs, tutorial guides, and user...

www.dji.com

Would recommend DJI Care Refresh as well.
Don't care how many batteries you have...it's not enough.

Flying with both feet on the ground!

If you do try out the simulator, be sure to remove your props first. Read read read is my best advice and watch every Spark tutorial on YouTube. The more you know the less the chance of you losing it. And be sure to ask any question you like here.... nobody's going to raz you for what you may think is a dumb one.

Member

They claim 16 minutes of battery life. I bought the fly more combo which came with two battery’s. I start recording before I take off and stop recording when I land. I only end up with about 8-9 minute recordings and that is using the drone until it hits 30% battery.

Well-Known Member

They claim 16 minutes of battery life. I bought the fly more combo which came with two battery’s. I start recording before I take off and stop recording when I land. I only end up with about 8-9 minute recordings and that is using the drone until it hits 30% battery.

The 16 mins advertised is probably from power on to 0% battery. You will get a more accurate flight time measurement if you see your flight records instead of just looking at the recorded video length. Landing at 15~20% battery, I get about 11~13mins of flight time.

Member

I read somewhere the two biggest reasons for drone fly-aways are (1) Wind and (2) Settings. (1) Wind is obvious, remember the windspeed dramatically increase as you gain height, so don't take any chances. (2) Make sure you understand all the settings before taking off for the first time - there are lost of YouTube videos explaining them all. Don't assume the default settings are safe to just take off after unpacking!

I found first flying in beginner mode and after that, tripod mode, makes you feel save initially and builds your confidence ... and gives you nice footage already!

Member

Well-Known Member

They claim 16 minutes of battery life. I bought the fly more combo which came with two battery’s. I start recording before I take off and stop recording when I land. I only end up with about 8-9 minute recordings and that is using the drone until it hits 30% battery.

If you're flying nearby, 30% reserve is too high. You'll get another 2-3 mins. before things get serious. Doesn't seem like much, but every minute counts! I get 11+ mins and I consider myself conservative. Well, maybe not in the below example. I was just flying as fast as I could for fun. So no way I'm ever going to get close to 16...lol.

Member

I’ve noticed the more that I fly it it the better the battery life has gotten. I’ve gone from 10 minute flights to about 12 minute flights. I have noticed that if you fly fully in sport mode the battery lasts a lot longer. Now of course I take it out of sport mode to get the smooth shots but. I fly to where I want in sport mode to get more out of the battery.

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